Days Gone Remastered review: unrealized potential

In April 2019, Days Gone, a long-awaited AAA exclusive for PlayStation 4, was released. Although critics received the game rather coldly (due to technical problems on release), over time, the story of biker Deacon gained a large community of loyal fans. It had great potential, and a large fan base was waiting for a sequel — a full-fledged, story-driven one with developing ideas.

Days Gone Remastered (PS5)

Pluses:

new game modes, including permanent death and speedrun; good optimization; faster loading; unlocked 60 frames; PS5 features, including game maps and help.

Minuses:

The game doesn't live up to the subtitle «remaster»; the visuals have been improved slightly; the potential of Dualsense is only partially unlocked.

6.5/10

Rating
ITC.ua

But recently, Sony and the game’s developers from Bend studio have repeatedly stated that we shouldn’t expect a sequel. Given the commercial success of the project (more than 9 million copies were sold back in 2022), it seemed that the Japanese platform holder simply went on principle and decided to have nothing more to do with the franchise. It is not surprising that the announcement of the remaster in February this year was a very unexpected event. And now, after spending a minimal amount of money on marketing for two months, the publisher has released Days Gone Remastered. Who is the updated version for, and did it fulfill the hopes of the fans?

This review is an analysis of the technical part of the game on a regular PS5 and its differences from the original. We will not talk about the story and gameplay here.

Content

1 What’s the schedule?
2 Graphic modes: finally 60 frames
3 Download speed and game file size: there are improvements
4 Saves, trophies and game cards: almost clear
5 Additional passing modes

What’s the schedule?

The updated version of Days Gone Remastered on PS5 is not a dramatic leap forward, but rather a set of subtle improvements. The character models remain virtually unchanged: although the polygonality may have increased slightly, it doesn’t strike the eye in the game, even in quality mode. Hair physics and post-processing of clothing materials look a bit outdated. Although in cutscenes the textures look a little better, globally — it’s still the same level as in the PS4 version. The developers have worked a little more on the visual quality of the environment, in particular, on the stones and vegetation, which has become more numerous in the quality mode.

Global lighting has also seen minor improvements, with better simulation of indirect lighting and shadows. Post-processing — depth of field, smoke, motion blur — look a little better, but these are still cosmetic tweaks, not a new visual level. Given that many of these changes were already available in the PC version, there was no breakthrough for PS5 players.

Summarizing the visual aspect of the game, we should admit an unpleasant fact: the word Remastered in the title, although formally justified Remaster — is a change in the sound or image quality of previously created forms of media, serves more for marketing purposes. The updated version still looks like a 5-year-old game. It was a gorgeous game for its time, but it’s still obvious to a modern gamer that it comes from the past.

Graphic modes: finally 60 frames

The game works in two modes:

4K at 30 fps
1440p at 60 fps

In both modes, Days Gone Remastered delivers a stable frame rate. Switching between them is instantaneous (It turns out that it is possible, the developers of Forza Horizon 5) — without restarting the game, which is convenient, but accompanied by strange console behavior. In my case, while in the main menu of the game, when I changed the graphics mode to «Performance» PS5, it started making a strange cooler noise that did not disappear over time. I didn’t notice this when changing the graphics mode during a pause in the game, so maybe it’s just a technical flaw.

Of course, the 60 frames unlock is a big plus. The game does hold a stable 60 FPS, but the experience is spoiled by overly aggressive optimization in performance mode.

For example, in forest areas, objects such as vegetation and shadows are drawn literally 4-5 meters away from the hero. This breaks the illusion of a living game world — it gives the impression of artificiality, which is hard to ignore. That’s why I personally chose the quality mode. The picture remains smooth even with the lower FPS, but there are no noticeable artifacts that spoil the overall perception and take away attention.

Download speed and game file size: there are improvements

Unfortunately, I don’t have my PlayStation 4 anymore, so I haven’t had a chance to objectively compare the download speeds of the two versions. But having downloaded the PS4 version on a PS5 for comparison, the difference in loading times is noticeable. The PS5 version loads twice as fast as the version for the previous generation console. This is especially noticeable when restarting or moving between large areas. Whereas the PS4 version can sometimes take as long as a minute to load, Remastered shows a loading screen of no more than 30 seconds. But you have to admit, this is also not a small amount compared to modern projects.

Interestingly, with all the minor visual updates, the game doesn’t take up much more disk space (45 GB versus 41 GB in the PS4 version). This is the result of better compression and cleaning up of unnecessary resources that were used for the PS4 version.

Days Gone Remastered adds support for PS5 features — adaptive triggers and 3D sound, although they are implemented in a restrained manner. Adaptive triggers or DualSense haptic feedback are minimally used. This is doubly unfortunate because this is where the PS5 could have given the game a new feel — for example, making motorcycle driving, which takes a long time to complete, more interesting and authentic.

Saves, trophies and game cards: almost clear

Days Gone Remastered supports transferring saves from PS4. And not just progress — trophies are automatically transferred as well. That is, if you had a platinum, you will get it a second time immediately after starting the save. This trick, while nice for collectors, exposed PSN’s statistics: on the second day after the remaster was released, 23% of users completed the game — in fact, most simply transferred their save.

The PS5 version of the game offers such features of Sony’s current AAA exclusives as game cards and video hints. Also, on the game’s launch screen, you can see the percentage of completion of story missions. This is one of the most obvious advantages of the native PS5 version.

Additional passing modes

Another advantage of Days Gone Remastered is its two new game modes:

«Permanent death»
«Speedran»

The first one is a real challenge: one character death — and you start from the beginning of the game or chapter (this choice is given when you start the story campaign, you cannot change it later). In addition, in this mode, you will have only one save slot available, and you can only record a new one at certain stages of the game. So if you want to play in this mode, get ready for game sessions to take a long time.

The «Speedrun» mode allows you to complete the campaign as quickly as possible and share your time in a special final rating.

PriceFor PS4 and PC owners, the remaster will cost $10, while on PS5 it will cost —$50.

Conclusion:

Despite some minor improvements, Days Gone Remastered is more like a technical update than a full-fledged remaster. The lack of significant changes in character design and the use of modern technologies limits its appeal to new players. For fans of the original, it might be a nice return to the atmospheric world of post-apocalyptic Oregon. Overall, the update doesn't live up to the expectations that could arise from a remaster of a game with such potential. Yes, there are some nice features: faster loading times, game maps, stable 60 FPS, and save transfers. But in the end — we have a purely technical work that impresses only by how much hasn't changed.

If you've already played Days Gone before, there's no particular reason to return. But for new players, this is the best version of Days Gone yet, providing dozens of hours of a touching story of a man trying to find his beloved wife.